How Early Childhood Educators' Beliefs About Emotions and Educator-Student Relationships Enhance Understanding of Support of Emotion Regulation for Children with Varying Abilities: A Convergent Mixed Methods Study

• Author / Creator

  Nosworthy, Nicole, M. I.

• Emotion regulation has been singled out as a critical component of social functioning and other psychological processes (e.g., focus attention, promote problem solving, support relationships). Early Learning and Care (ELC) educators have been identified as key agents of children's emotion regulation support because of the ample time they spend with children who attend ELC centres. Supporting emotion regulation in young children is a complex process and there are many factors which contribute to how educators support emotion regulation development in young children (e.g., educator's beliefs and behaviours, culture, educator-student relationships, and psychological characteristics). Educators’ view of children's emotion regulation is influenced through the interaction of these factors, yet it is unknown how these factors may lead to the support they give to children with differing levels of emotion regulation abilities. The focus of this study was: how do emotion beliefs and educator-student relationships enhance understanding of early learning and care (ELC) educators' support of varying emotion regulation in young children? Two sub research questions were explored in this study, (a) how do ELC educators’ emotion beliefs enhance understanding of ELC educators’ support of varying abilities of emotion regulation in young children? and (b) how do educator-student relationships enhance understanding of ELC educators support of varying abilities of emotion regulation in young children? This convergent mixed method study was conducted using both qualitative (interview) and quantitative (questionnaire) data from seven ELC educators on their emotion beliefs, student’s emotion regulation, and educator-student relationships (with 41 students). The major finding was that the support educators provide children of varying emotion regulation is impacted by their emotion beliefs, which in turn impacts the quality of relationship with the children. These findings urge ELC educators to reflect on their emotion beliefs and relationship with students that may be constraining in their support of emotion regulation to students with differing emotion regulation abilities.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Support of emotion regulation
  • Emotion beliefs
  • Educator-student relationships
  • Early childhood

• Graduation date

  Spring 2016

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Doctor of Philosophy

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3445HP7X

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.